A US professor at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is accusing technology giants Facebook and Google of promoting false information on their platforms about the presidential elections in Democratic Republic of Congo.

In a post on Medium Ethan Zuckerman shared screengrabs of advertisements on the two platforms declaring Emmanuel Ramazani Shadary, the ruling party's candidate, as the winner.

The electoral commission said results of last week's election were delayed because less than half the ballots had arrived.

The influential Catholic church, which deployed 40,000 observers during the 30 December election, said that it knows who won the election. Its statement has been condemned by officials in President Joseph Kabila's government.

"Facebook and Google’s powerful ad systems may be being used to reinforce election fraud, either by targeting these ads to Brazzaville or to DRC itself, where a small number of people are still on the internet," he added.

He said that he is collecting similar images that "we can ask Google and Facebook to prevent the transmission of false information that could be used to cement a stolen election."